An Open Letter to the Entertainment Industry

By Rolene Marks

Throughout the decades, many of you from stage, screen and the recording arts have been voices for what you believe in. You have united against Apartheid South Africa, marched for the #MeToo movement, advocated for gender parity and told the world that Black Lives Matter.

There is one area where you have been conspicuous – not just by your silence – but by your inversion of human rights. We are speaking about the human rights of Israelis and the Jewish people. While it is important to advocate for the rights of Palestinian civilians who are as trapped by Hamas as we in Israel are, there is a propensity for many of you to take the carefully crafted propaganda from Hamas, sponsored by the Muslim Brotherhood as absolute fact.

Facts have become the first casualty of this war that Hamas forced upon both Israelis and Palestinians. Facts are important. Lives are at stake. Antisemitism has risen to levels not seen since before the Holocaust and while many of you have taken to stage, screen and petition, no doubt with honorable intentions, it is important that you understand the facts.

• Thousands of entertainment industry professionals signed a letter stating they would boycott members of the Israeli film industry “they believe are connected to genocide.” It has been proven (see links and definition below) that there has been no genocide committed in the Gaza strip during this war rather this slur is designed to demonize the Jewish state. To exclude fellow artists from your industry because of their ethnicity is racist. The Israeli film industry represents a myriad of views and opinions and provides employment, including to Palestinians. Boycotting Israeli filmmakers not only silences Palestinians; but also robs them of employment opportunities.
• Two hundred industry celebrities signed a petition to release Palestinian prisoner, Marwan Barghouti. Barghouti is serving five consecutive life sentences for the murders of Israelis. He is also serving time for 20 charges of attempted murder. He is not the Palestinian equivalent of Nelson Mandela. Any attempts to draw comparisons is an appalling insult to his victims, including Father (Priest) Tsibouktzakis. The second intifada, which saw the murders of over 1000 Israelis, was not a romantic uprising of “freedom fighters”. It was deliberate, targeted murder. Signing a petition calling for his release endorses the murder of Israelis.
• Removal of music from Israeli sources – while many disagree with how Israel has prosecuted this war (without offering their expert military opinions about how to fight a war with an unprecedented battlefield scenario), removing access to music for Israelis, many who have experienced unbearable loss is not in the interest of peace or the Palestinians, it is discriminatory and racist. Have any of the artists who have done this removed their music from British, French, and American etc. streamers because civilians have been tragically killed in war?
• Exclusion of Jews who support Israel, i.e. Zionists from artistic spaces. Zionism is the national liberation movement of the Jewish people and the belief in the right of Israel to exist as the only nation state of the Jewish people in our ancestral homeland. Zionism, despite the many attempts by Israel’s detractors to use it as a slur, is not about dispossessing anyone. There has never been a state of Palestine and Jews have maintained a continuous presence in the land that carries the story of the Jewish people, amply proven through antiquity. Excluding Jewish artists for a fundamental religious belief or saying that every nation has the right to determine its own future except for the Jewish people is racist.
• The demonization of Israelis on stage and screen. Israel is the Jewish state – when you demonize Israelis, you effectively enable hate speech against Jews.

The slurs that are employed against Israel and the Jewish people are not just catchy phrases. They have specific and legal definitions. On 14 December, 15 people, nearly all Jewish, were murdered at a candle-lighting event to celebrate the first night of Chanukah. Nobody in the shattered Jewish community of Sydney where the terror attack took place was surprised. Routine demonization of the Jewish state, including by many in the entertainment industry who have parroted Hamas propaganda, including the blood libel that 14 000 Palestinian children would die in a matter of hours from starvation to your millions of followers has helped foster a climate of hate which led to the inevitable.  Not only did 14 000 children not die, many did not remove it from their social media – or apologise. While some of you expressed your sorrow at the murder of Jewish men, women and children in Bondi – many also neglected to mention that they were of the Jewish faith. Words have weight and it important we understand what they mean. Lives are at stake. 

Apartheid – from the Afrikaans, to “separateness”, lit. ’aparthood’) was a system of institutionalized racial segregation that existed in South Africa and South West Africa (now Namibia) from 1948 to the early 1990s.[note 1] It was characterized by an authoritarian political culture which ensured that South Africa was dominated politically, socially, and economically by the nation’s minority white population. The rights of all citizens in Israel are enshrined in the Declaration of Independence. All citizens of Israel are fully enfranchised. To call Israel an Apartheid state, makes a mockery of the true victims of the racist system and is inherently factually incorrect. Palestinians fall under the remit of Hamas (presently) in Gaza and the Palestinian Authority in the territories they control in Judea and Samaria (West Bank).

Genocide –  The word “Genocide”, first coined by Polish-Jewish lawyer, Raphael Lemkin, has a specific legal definition and refers to certain acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. It does not pertain to civilian deaths in times of war and Israel is not committing genocide in Gaza. This is evidenced by the lack of intent, low civilian vs combatant ratio as demonstrated in the links below, forming of humanitarian corridors, humanitarian aid entry, vaccinations against disease like polio, evacuation of medically vulnerable to other countries for treatment, early warning of impending strikes and more. Hamas and other terror organizations committed genocide and acts of mass sexual violence during their invasion into Israel on 7 October 2023.

Colonization – the establishing of a colony subjugation of a people or area especially as an extension of state power. Israel unilaterally withdrew from Gaza in 2005 and has sued for peace on many occasions – and each offer refused. Zionism is the opposite of colonization; it is the returning of the Jewish people to their ancient home, a modern-day miracle.

Sadly, when your voices were needed the most, many of you were silent. Many of you wore pins on your clothes to awards ceremonies. You claimed they were in support of a ceasefire – but the reality is that they were the symbol of the lynching of two IDF soldiers. How many of you were aware of that? None of you wore yellow ribbons to call for the immediate release of the over 250 hostages that were taken on 7 October including babies, Holocaust survivors and whole families.

You marched for gender parity and for the #MeToo movement – but were silent or derisive when our women and girls were raped on 7 October and silent when our hostages, including the males were sexually violated by their terrorist captor.

You were silent when Hamas paraded our emaciated released hostages or our babies in coffins in grotesque ceremonies that were carnivals of the grotesque.

You were silent as millions of Israelis were attacked from seven fronts, including the hundreds of ballistic missiles that rained down on our cities from Iran, destroying city blocks.

You were silent when nearly 400 young festivalgoers who danced for peace were hunted down and slaughtered.

You are unusually silent about the ceasefire in place. A ceasefire that has exposed Hamas’s inhumane treatment of Palestinians as they attempt to rebuild. Is it because you know that countries who “commit genocide” do not offer peace plans? You marched for civil rights for BLM but remain silent about the astronomic rise of antisemitism. Why?

Facts matter. For many, Israel-Palestine is the cause du jour. For the people of Israel and Gaza – this is our lives. Please review the following links compiled by historians and researchers for important facts:

 The Henry Jackson Society presents research on civilian casualty figures in Gaza: https://henryjacksonsociety.org/publications/questionable-counting/

War scholar and Chair of Urban Warfare studies at WestPoint Academy, Maj (ret) John Spencer examines claims of genocide:
https://macdonaldlaurier.ca/im-a-war-scholar-there-is-no-genocide-in-gaza-john-spencer-on-x/

COGAT the IDF Unit for the coordination of humanitarian aid dashboard:
https://gaza-aid-data.gov.il/mainhome/

The UK All Parties Parliamentary Commission in depth report into the atrocities of 7 October:
https://www.7octparliamentarycommission.co.uk

Dinah Project Report into crimes of sexual violence committed on 7 October: https://thedinahproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/The-Dinah-Project-full-report-A4-pages_web-2.pdf

We ask you to consider the facts. We invite you to visit Israel to see and hear the reality for yourself. We implore you to be bridge builders and not create division. We ask you to speak of peace for both Israelis and Palestinians.

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